Quest for Booty: Deleted Scene
by super-sad-instrumental
Summary: "Deleted Scene" from Quest for Booty. Smuggler seems to be, again, the only guy around who can help Ratchet, this time to find his best friend. But what if Talwyn has something to say about it? Some RatchetXTalwyn. Probably ONESHOT. A lot of gun-pointing.


"Now, of cource, I couldn't offer my services without, hmm, say..." the Smuggler said with a shruk of his shoulders like it was a casual thing to say.

"Cold hard cash! AWK!" his parrot filled in. Ratchet rolled his eyes with a sigh. He had kinda known it would be the Smuggler who could read the map when he saw the guy just standing in the beach of Hoolefar Island. It was ALWAYS him. And every time Ratchet ended up trusting him. A voice in Ratchet's head said "_No way, not again!"_ but he just coudn't get the words out of his mouth. He had too much at stake. Ratchet couldn't just say no to the most likely only guy around who could read Decadroid and therefor the map to find Darkwater Cove, the whereabouts of the Fulcrum Star. And with that, Ratchet would find out Clank's location. So, he just sighed and gave the bolts the Smuggler needed. The tall guy with a parrot smirked and took the bolts cheerfully.

"Aww, thank you kindly, friend. Let's go!

"I'm not your friend" Ratchet thought in his head annoyed. Instead, he just said "Let's go" himself and turned around, but stopped right there. He had forgotten something, or SOMEONE.

"C'mon, partner. What do you say we, uhh... _borrow_... that skiff?" the Smuggler said in his usual style pointing at the pirate ship in the dock. Instead of an answer from the Lombax he heard one behind him.

"You can _borrow_ it all you want after we can be sure you won't do something you _might_ regret" a determined female voice said behing him. When the Smuggler turned around he was suprised to see that a gun was held towards him.

"Whoa" he stated and raised his hands a bit. "What did I ever do to you, lady?" He had seen the Lombax arrive with a Markazian female. He was almost sure about her identidy too.

"Not me, you thief" Talwyn Apogee said almost showing her anger to the tall guy with a parrot. She had seem him the first time she and Ratchet were on Hoolefar Island and also on her fathers space station. He was a smuggler and she knew smugglers were the last people one could trust, after space pirates of cource...who at least had a code. And she knew Ratchet had encountered this certain smuggler before, once with severe consequence.

"Tal, he can help. He knows how to read the map" Ratchet said lowering his friend's gun. "It's okey"

Talwyn put her gun down slowly but still gave the Smuggler a harsh look. "You really think we can trust this guy? He's a smuggler!"

"AWK! He's a smuggler! Don't trust a smu..." the red parrot screamed, but was silenced quickly when the owner took the bird's beak in his hand

"I see my reputation precedes me" said the Smuggler with a false smile and let the parrot breath. "Still, I don't think we have been properly introduced. You can call me Smuggler..."

"How original. Is your pet's name _Parrot_?" Talwyn said with a venom voice. Ratchet let a laugh escape his mouth, but soon stood in silence again. The Smuggler just smirked quickly and continued:

"Well, aren't you sassy, Miss Apogee. You are Max Apogee's kid, right? I had some, um, _business_ going on your dad's space station a while ago..."

"Business, AWK! Dirty business!" the parrot accompanied.

"I noticed. Now go rob someone else's bolts" Talwyn spit the words and started walking away to the dock. The Smuggler dropped his head to the side and sneered: "Well, I kinda did already."

Talwyn stopped and turned around crossing her arms and raising a brow to Ratchet. The Lombax looked from Talwyn to Smuggler and vice versa a few times and then just said:

"It was more like...monetary compensation..." but stopped when he saw his Markazian friend's not-so-friendly expression. Talwyn just shook her head and walked to the ship mumbling to herself. The Smuggler laughed at the Lombax's disadvantage and said:

"Well said, partner!" He hit the much smaller creature to the back causing him to fall to the sand and then walked towards the ship himself.

Ratchet lifted himself up rubbing his suprisingly sore back and sighed. It had gone _better_ than he'd expected. He thought Talwyn was actually gonna shoot the guy for just mentioning her father's name. To tell the truth, Ratchet didn't like the idea having to trust the Smuggler again. He _did_ just dump the Lombax and Clank out of his ship in Stratus City to save himself. How was Ratchet suppose to know he wouldn't do it again? But it was _Clank_. Ratchet was just hoping Talwyn understood that no one in the whole universe meant more to the young Lombax than his best friend Clank, and that Ratchet would do _anything_ to get him back, even trust a smuggler.

Talwyn was already aboard, leaning to the ship's railing, when she saw the Smuggler getting aboard as well, while Ratchet was still on the beach walking slowly with a hand on his back. The Smuggler came next to her and laughed, his hand on his hat:

"He sure is a tough little thing!"

Talwyn didn't know why she basicly hated the guy. She figured it was because Ratchet somehow still trusted him, though what happened in Stratus City. _If that had happened to me_, Talwyn thought to herself, _I would have at least gave it a second thought before I agreed to anything!_ But she knew Ratchet didn't have much choise, he HAD to find Clank. Talwyn hadn't known the Lombax that long, but she saw the love he had to for his little robot. Now that was true friendship. She also saw that he could never care about anyone else that much. It was okey, though. Talwyn Apogee was just fine on her own.

"I actually met your dad once" the Smuggler said, when his comment about the Lombax didn't seem to get a response from the female Markazian. Smuggler usually just did what he was payed to do, that was his job, but he was really annoyed by this girl, who seemed to hate him without a reason (he couldn't think of one anyway). _Let's see how much will it take to get the girl to say something_, he thought to himself smirking a bit.

"Yeah, at the Apogee Space Station. It is a true gold mine, full of Leviathan Souls! Anyway, your dad, now he was _really_ interested about the industry, if you know what I mean. But after all, 'smuggling' and 'collecting rare interstellar antiquities' go quite hand in hand, don't you think?"

The Smuggler would have had yet many more things to say, but he knew that when someone points a gun at your head, you might want to stay silent.


End file.
